Roles of β-Endorphin in Stress, Behavior, Neuroinflammation, and Brain Energy Metabolism

Abstract

β-Endorphins are peptides that exert a wide variety of effects throughout the body. Produced through the cleavage pro-opiomelanocortin (POMC), β-endorphins are the primarily agonist of mu opioid receptors, which can be found throughout the body, brain, and cells of the immune system that regulate a diverse set of systems. As an agonist of the body’s opioid receptors, β-endorphins are most noted for their potent analgesic effects, but they also have their involvement in reward-centric and homeostasis-restoring behaviors, among other effects. These effects have implicated the peptide in psychiatric and neurodegenerative disorders, making it a research target of interest. This review briefly summarizes the basics of endorphin function, goes over the behaviors and regulatory pathways it governs, and examines the variability of β-endorphin levels observed between normal and disease/disorder affected individuals.

Changes of Endothelin-1 and Calcitonin Gene-Related Peptide Concentrations in Patients with Cervical Radiculopathy after Wrist-Ankle Acupuncture-Moxibustion and Hot Compression with Chinese Herbal Medicine

“…β -EP is a peptide that plays a variety of roles in the whole body. It has been found to have strong analgesic activities [ 33 ]. SP is a peptide mainly generated by neurons, which is involved in many biological processes, such as injury and inflammation [ 34 ].…”

Neuroendocrine Factors in Melanoma Pathogenesis

“…Beta-endorphin (β-endorphin) is an endogenous opioid peptide acting as an agonist for opioid receptors, with a high affinity for μ-OR, moderate affinity for δ-OR, and lower affinity for κ-OR [ 293 , 294 ]. Beta-endorphin is produced in neurons located in the hypothalamus, amygdala, and pituitary gland and plays multiple central roles in the organism, being involved in pain management, reward system, behavior, stress regulation, and other homeostatic functions [ 295 , 296 , 297 , 298 ]. However, β-endorphin also exhibits activity in peripheral tissues, most notably peripheral analgesia, through a mechanism involving an interplay with the immune system.…”

The natural history of musical rhythm: functional and mechanistic theories on the evolution of human rhythm cognition and the relevance of rhythmic animal behaviors

“…Several of the findings reported recently relate specifically to rhythm perception or rhythmic synchronization, and may account for mechanisms which, evolutionarily, promoted a predilection for rhythmic communication and facilitated the cross-generational transmission -and thus preservation -of musical behaviors (see 2.3, 2.5 for theories featuring such arguments). Indeed, all of these neurotransmitters are known to promote psychological well-being through interactions with the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis (for reviews, see, e.g., Carson et al, 2013;Pilozzi et al, 2020;Stanwood, 2019), which, in turn, are thought to mediate prosociality during communal performance. These neurotransmitters are, thus, crucial for achieving the adaptive benefits of musicality proposed by various functional theories on the evolution of musicality (as reviewed in section 2).…”